[tylermenezes]

It's funny, because it seems to me that a lot of the talent coming out of UW CSE isn't going to make it into the valley in any meaningful way.

UW CSE is still entirely focused on grades. There's literally no way to include anything but grades in your admission application -- not even recommendation letters. I've talked to some of the admissions faculty, and their argument is that it's unfair to people who are totally new to computer science to deny them on the basis of a lack of prior experience. I totally disagree with this, however -- you're not going to get into a music or acting program without any prior experience, why should you get into a CS program?

From what I've seen, a lot of UW graduates end up getting recruited into a big company (Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Intel, etc). It's by all means a great program, but it seems like they're never going to have someone they can point to as a success like, for example, Harvard, Stanford, or MIT. I think that's the reason why their reputation is a lot more quiet.

FWIW, my co-founder and I have both been rejected from UW CSE (me with an overall 3.8 GPA and several conference papers published as first author while I was still in high school).

[irollboozers]

Lol, this is why I laughed to myself when reading this article.

There are tons, I mean tons, of great startups coming out of UW, but they are not coming from the CSE program. They are coming from math, physics, life sciences, and even the entrepreneurship program at the Foster b-school. All the kids who I've met making waves in the Seattle startup scene are informally trained hackers. Oh and by the way, did I mention they are all young and under 23-24, and not PhD/Master's students?

This article is all good for the image of the school and Seattle, but it fails to grasp the real movement of the scene. The movers and shakers, the ones at the crest of a huge potential tsunami in Seattle, are the young people who never got the silver spoon of CS programs, and thus will never be lured away to cushy $80k jobs as entry-level coder at Amazon.

[ken]

I think you're right about UW CSE, but I'd like to point out similar observations on a different axis.

I know lots of software people in and around Seattle, and I've worked at a couple startups here. A few are "informally trained hackers", but most are formally trained -- only elsewhere (mostly Stanford, or east coast schools you've heard of).

While everyone knows that UW has a good CS department, I don't think I know a single person who went there. I actually know more programmers who went to Whitman (one) than UW.

I don't know where they're going: maybe they leave town, or maybe they're getting hired by big companies, or maybe I'm just hanging out in the wrong circles (quite possible).

[seanmcdirmid]

It used to be that most UW CSE grads went down to Intel, these days many are off to Google; I'm sure some of them even make their way to Microsoft, but its not a large program so its not like you would see many around outside some otherwise obvious places.

Coolness about Whitman. Walla Walla doesn't get enough love.

[tylermenezes]

Most everyone I know from the CSE program who've graduated are now working for Facebook. They seem to be a major recruiter from there. They even opened a Seattle office fairly recently.

[nickbarnwell]

> It's funny, because it seems to me that a lot of the talent coming out of UW CSE isn't going to make it into the valley in any meaningful way.

This, exactly, has been my sentiment since starting at UW. There are plenty of capable, intelligent people who seem to have never written code prior to starting on the CS track. On the whole, the undergraduate program seems to have a very myopic focus. CS is not Biochemistry or Particle Physics - the equipment requirement is $50 for a used Ti-83 to learn BASIC on and catch the bug.

> but it seems like they're never going to have someone they can point to as a success like, for example, Harvard, Stanford, or MIT. I think that's the reason why their reputation is a lot more quiet.

I think the canonical success is Jeff Dean...who went there for graduate school and was immensely successful beforehand. For what it's worth, Harvard doesn't have too many success stories either. Both Gates and Zuckerberg dropped out, and it's a school with a reputation for fostering careers more than entrepreneurship. In many ways, it's more similar to UW than UW is to Stanford.

[BadassFractal]

On that note, I've always been impressed by how Stanford instructors assume that their students will be founding companies in the future.

It's very different from two of the other top 5 schools I've gone to, where you're told that if you succeed, one day you'll be working at Microsoft (in the olden days, not much anymore) or Facebook or some other hot uppercomer. It's somewhat demoralizing when you're taught how to write reports to upper management, always assuming that you want to be an employee (this was from a graduate program).

[ttan62]

Right there with you- as a current UW student who briefly considered CSE I decided against it because the mentality (the vibe, even) of the department clashed against my startup aspirations and the learning mindset necessary for creating a startup.

I was instead drawn to the Informatics program, which is less technical but provides a much better environment for entrepreneurship: we trade project management, information organization, and a web design/development focus for computer science theory and engineering.

A tragic design/planning flaw of UW is that the engineering departments are on the opposite side of campus (~8 minute walk) from the business school. Collaboration is isolated and leaves little serendipitous idea exchanges that could very well develop into potent startups. I can only imagine how things might be different if UW had made the two neighbors...

[WildUtah]

Wait.

I'm confused reading the admission comments. It seems you get admitted to UW undergrad, and then after two years you apply to the CSE thing. Are you considered undeclared until then? Is there any kind of test or is it entirely based on grades in the initial weeder classes?

That seems like kind of a big risk to people who want to study a specific subject and might not get admitted to it. The'd just have to switch career ambitions or start over at another college with about a one year delay for transferring.

Most state schools I see admit you to a specific major before you matriculate. Then you can change fairly flexibly within your department if you have the right classes and good grades. Elite schools usually admit undeclared students and then have them choose an area of study after a year with no further admission criteria.

Are the UW faculty trying to build an elite program inside a non-elite university? That's an interesting idea, but I don't think I'd want to be the guinea pig who has to suffer for it.

[seanmcdirmid]

First, UW is already mostly an elite university; its very hard to get in these days without the means to also getting into other elite universities like Stanford or UCB.

Second, if all you want to do is make it into UW CSE, it is a risk. I remember the anxiety I went through as an undergrad waiting to here about whether I was excepted into the program or not. I got in, but it was by no means certain (I had 2.9/3.2/3.8 grades for physics, mostly do to me being slow to adjust to high-pressure weed out classes).

I believe most public state schools are like this, they might have a few programs that are very high-quality compared to others, and therefore have to limit supply even after they have accepted students into the general population.

[nickbarnwell]

> First, UW is already mostly an elite university

UW had a ~58% admit rate in 2011, MIT's was 9.6%, Harvard's was 6.2%, and Stanford was 7.1%. To say "it's very hard to get in these days without the means to also getting into other elite universities" is patently false.

[seanmcdirmid]

Admit rates for private schools are lower since they generally take from a national pool, and the schools are quite popular (lots of noise applications with no chance of getting in). In comparison, UCB has a 21% admit rate from a large state of California and lots of other research schools in competition (UCSD, UCLA, UCD...). UW is only one of two research state schools in Washington, the other being WSU way across the state. Admission is incredibly convoluted: you chance of getting in from the Seattle area is much lower than Eastern Washington, and out of state students have a higher chance than in state (they pay more tuition). This means there are cases (personally known of) where a student is rejected from UW and is accepted into UCB and Stanford (though they have to pay a lot more tuition accordingly).

[nickbarnwell]

I am very aware of how the process works and how one's chances are based on holistic factors. Regardless, I spent the last year at UW and to say it's an elite school one would need to ignore large swaths of those who attend. I have had the fortune to speak with tens of former and current Stanford attendees while at Google this summer - overwhelmingly their ability to carry on an interesting conversation, make nuanced insights into diverse topics, and otherwise convey the impression that they are learned individuals far exceeds that of your typical UW student. That is not to say that they don't exist - I could say the same for a handful of UW students - merely that their number is far smaller, and that that greatly impacts the culture.

If you want empirical data, a student in the 25th percentile at MIT has a higher SAT score than someone in the 75th at UW. The SAT has been shown to be a fairly reliable indicator of earning potential.

[1] Estimating the Payoff to Attending a More Selective College, Dale & Krueger

[seanmcdirmid]

UW is still a local state school; you shouldn't expect that students come in with the level of prep as say MIT or Stanford. Its elitness is local and comes mainly from the challenge of getting in, which, for those that bother to try (because they are in the Seattle area), is painful enough! UW also tended to weed students out rather early while I was there; 50% of my friends from the incoming class were gone by the time I hit my sophmore year.

Of course, UW is not as exclusive as UW CSE, but to suggest UW itself is just a so so University is insulting to me.

[geebee]

This is a slightly complicated topic. It comes down to a substantial difference between elite state institutions and elite privates, undergraduate and graduate programs, and engineering/cs vs general majors.

Elite private universities (stanford, harvard) tend to have very small undergraduate populations and draw from a national or international pool of applicants. This of course makes them highly selective, as spots are scarce and the applicant pool is large. Public universities (Berkeley, UW) have very large undergraduate student bodies (often 5 times the size of a small private) and require a much larger portion of in-state students. More slots, smaller applicant pool means a much higher admission rate and generally lower numbers (SATs and so forth). Like another poster mentioned, 25%ile at MIT > 75% at UW, but the top 25% of the class at UW is larger than the entire undergrad population at MIT. The difference in nature of undergraduate admissions makes the averaging kind of meaningless.

At the graduate level, elite private and public universities tend to admit roughly similar numbers of students. And not surprisingly, admission rates are much more comparable. Elite publics, for some reason, seem to do particularly well at the grad level in engineering and computer science (aside from Cornell, the ivies don't really show up much on the top 10 lists, while Berkeley, Illinois, Michigan, Texas, and so forth are highly ranked - by the same magazine (US News) that doesn't put a single public into the top 20 at the undergrad level).

Lastly, there is the question of the degree itself. At top publics, engineering often requires a second admissions process - you get into Berkeley or UW, and then you have to keep your grades high enough to gain admission to the engineering or CS major. You can gain admission directly to the major from high school, but that's tougher. And the process of getting the degree itself is daunting - I don't know much about UW, but the coursework in CS at Berkeley is extremely rigorous (and I have no reason to think it wouldn't be at UW as well). As with UW, Berkeley does have a much larger undergraduate population. It's less selective because of that (and the in-state quota), but on the way out, we're talking about students in the top quarter of the class, from a major that is extremely difficult to enter and complete.

All in all, I'm not surprised that people would feel that the undergrads who make it out of CS from UW are among the top grads that year. The grad level programs are already known to be top 10, so I don't think that even comes up.

[edwinnathaniel]

North of Washington, across the border, we have 2 big name schools: UBC and SFU. Both schools require prospective students to spend 1 to 2 years (SFU 1-year, UBC 2-years) taking "required courses" (Math, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, CS courses, and a few GEs) before they can apply to the CS program.

Both UBC and SFU have solid track records (beating UW consistently) when it comes to ACM CS competition:

https://sites.google.com/site/ubcprogrammingteam/history

Yes, gotta start some sort of pride-war between schools no? :)

[specialist]

  taking "required courses" (Math, Physics, Chemistry, Biology...

So smart. Many of my best developers came from outside of CS: bus driver, ballet dancer, EE, history, poly sci, mfg, aerospace, etc.

[edwinnathaniel]

It's the same story with EE at UBC to my knowledge; they also have to spend 1-2 years taking required courses so they're not that far different really.

What is exactly you're trying to point out? :)

[tylermenezes]

There are quite a few universities which use this system. Basically, you get admitted to the school, take some prerequisite classes, then apply to the major. For most majors, just having taken the prerequisites will get you in. UW's CSE program is what's called "highly competitive", i.e. good luck.

And yes, it's quite high risk. After being rejected my co-founder printed out his rejection letter and framed it, dropped out of UW, and took a job as the head of development for a local iPhone shop. Most people either keep trying, or switch to a math major. It's extremely stupid and elitist.